Which setup for me?

[coolme]

Hi,

I've always been interested in music production and now I'm looking to put something small together to begin with. My interests in music range from orchestral to mixes of electronic and acoustic sounds.
I already own a descent computer with sound card (ASIO) and an electric piano with MIDI out. Now I'm looking at two software setups that should get me started:

- Cubase 5 Essential + Ik multimedia trio composer
- Sonar 8.5 Studio + Upgrade of dimension LE to dimention pro

I'm not very technical so I won't use much of the synths possibilities but rather take the sounds from dimension or IK trio and tweak them a bit. What I like about Cubase is the tidy and clear interface and I would go for the studio version but it's too expensive right now. On the other hand Sonar studio is a step up from cubase essential I believe and has native 64 bit support, but from what I've seen in the demo it looks a bit messy and less ergonomic, which is pretty crucial to me.

On a side note, is it possible to run cubase essential on a 64 bit OS?

I'm looking for any opinion regarding my options. Thanks already.